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Some Thoughts on Luke Perry frome One Stroke Survivorhttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MKinMotion/~3/kB_IMkGUoHY/
https://mkinmotion.com/2019/03/07/some-thoughts-on-luke-perry-frome-one-stroke-survivor/#respondThu, 07 Mar 2019 19:52:10 +0000http://mkinmotion.com/?p=1653Luke Perry passed 3/4/2019 due to complications of a massive stroke he had 4 days prior. As I approach4 years post-stroke, I can’t help comparing the two of us. He was 52. I was 40. Both too young for a stroke. That’s about it for things Luke Perry and I had in common. I’m sure there are several reasons that the average age of people having strokes is coming down over the years. I’m not well-read enough to know why. I only have my own experience, but I’ve had lots of interactions with fellow Brain injury survivors; certainly enough to know they are all different, and that we are all different with different stories of rescue, recovery, and rehab. I emerged to feel my “new normal” about a month relieved to have survived, because it was dicey there for a while. If it weren’t for some quick thinking and acting by friends my story would have been much different Ass details come out it will be interesting to see the details and tick-tock of his story.

But honestly, I don’t know how I feel or how I’m supposed to feel. I’m certain that I’m not feeling any Survivor’s guilt. After putting together as much of my story as I may ever be able to do, I know that I was lucky, what else can I say when I beat such odds? It’s easy to say I could have it worse, because I could, but rather look back on all my regrets, I’ve learned to focus on what I can control or change; and that’s the now

I wish I were half the patient, kind-hearted, gentleman he was in Colin’s story. Being a silent and polite jet passenger, I found Colin Hanks’ anecdote inspiring and a rather inspiring ideal image of how humanity should be. It’s no wonder why so many people who interacted with him are so generous with their words of praise. It’s pretty easy to be cynical when a celebrity passes and social media blows up over it. Better to celebrate someone’s impact while they are alive and perhaps live a life that deserves praise for our impact with the life we have.

Nearly 4 years into this, I still come across people who don’t know what happened 1224 days ago

So I’ve decided to resurrect my blog and make ut a place for me to share my life these days. In 2015, I survived a massive stroke.

I use that word “survived, accurately and intentionally Surviving 9/1 odds and still battling to recover and rejoin what’s left of the life I left behind. So many people don’t survive to fight their way down the long road toward recovery

Yes. I was 40 at the time and everyone from friends, family, and medical professionals were all surprised that I was so young. The only thing that surprised them nearly as much was that I was a non-smoker. Turns out Smoking is really bad for you. Do what you can to quit even if you’re just a casual/social smoker. Cold Turkey, patches, hypnosis, just quit it.

What caused you to have a stroke?

I have a family history of high blood pressure (hypertension) and went for years without a primary care doctor, so my high blood pressure was undiagnosed and untreated for who-knows-how-long. Couple that with some very stressful circumstances and rather unhealthy stress relief methods. I had pretty chronic headaches, some worse than others, but they likely masked some symptoms that should have prompted me to seek a primary care doctor. In hindsight, the headaches could have been blood vessels in my brain tearing creating a bleed that eventually clotted, stopping the flow of blood to my brain. I’ve put together plenty of pre-stroke regrets, but I accept that I can’t change the past, I can only control the NOW

What advice do you have for friends to avoid stroke?

If I haven’t already made my advice clear, Have regular check-ups with a primary care physician (PCP) that you trust and feel comfortable with them being familiar enough with you to notice any changes between visits. PCPs can put together referrals to specialists for symptoms or signs. Don’t be like me and stay away

Have a good sit-down with your family to get a clear picture of your family medical history. It’s good to know this for your sake, but also for your children or grandchildren.

What are the effects of your stroke?

This is kind of the crux of the whole thing. What’s still away from my old life, why I’ll never be the same.

Because My stroke happened on the right side of my brain, which for whatever reason affects the strength of my left side. That includes total lack of control or strength in my left arm, left hand, left leg. The call it hemiparesis or paralysis on the left side of my body. This has limited my mobility significantly. Confined me to a wheelchair or walking aid with assistance.

While I’ve been known to consistently have a lower affect than most people, something that I’ve been confronted for more times than I could count; That said, after waking up and catching up on what had happened, I had a pretty solid case of PBA. You can certainly Google that, but spoiler alert. It’s Pseudo Bulbar Affect, put simply, I cried a lot without a prompt or control. Another effect of PBA is laughing without reason and sometimes finding humor in unusual things.

Initial effects were a nearly complete loss of voice. I was lucky to.

I was reduced to a very faint whisper and resorted to some very frustrating sessions of writing things on a dry-erase board. Frustrating for the friends who had to interpret my terrible penmanship, and frustrating to me to just want to be able to say what I was trying to say

Where were you when you had the stroke?

Strangely, maybe luckily, I was asleep when the stroke occured. I woke up Monday 7/13/15 with a headache and not feeling well. Neither unusual symptom for a Monday morning. I went through my normal morning routine including showering, dressing, gathering and packing my things I kept in my messenger bag, took an Aleve for the headache which seemed normal based on the chronic headaches mentioned above. I’d borrowed one of the company vehicles with the thought of moving some patio furniture, I’d only recently moved in to a new place and was tstill filling in the spaces. Got in the truck in the truck would felt different and it was a relatively new route from my new home to work. Once I got to work, I drove to my usual parking area on the fourth floor, got out of the truck and walked to the stairway and down four flights of stairs, all without feeling any odd sensations. When I opened the door to my office “wing”, It seemed stuffy, which was typical for a monday in mid-July in Austin, so before making my coffee, I likely went to the thermostat to either get the fan going or A/C blowing to start circulating the stuffy air around. What I remember for sure was making a cup of coffee and heading in to my office. Feeling tired and not 100%, I went to sit in a comfortable leather chair I had in my office. When I went to sit down on the chair I got dizzy and flopped to the floor. I couldn’t seem to get up and ended up laying on my back on the floor of my office. Earlier I h’d texted one of mybest work friends to see if she could drive me home. Just about the time I was on the floor, she called to see what was going on for me to want to be taken home. I’m pretty sure I mentioned that I was on the floor and couldn’t get up. I remember slurring some words in the conversation. To my knowledge, this friend has and had no medical training, but after we ended our phone conversation, she called or texted a my office neighbor Mike, also a great friend in and out of work. that something is wrong. That third work-friend whose office happened to be in the office next door and was in my doorway within a few moments. After talking for a moment they quickly and decisively

Called 911. To say our office was a maze is an understatement, so after hearing that an ambulance was being sent, My work friend Mike ran out to the cross street by our offices to wave down the ambulance and lead them through the maze to my office. It starts to get fuzzy here on out. I remember the bustle of the EMTs coming into my office. They put down a stretcher and helped me on to it. That was my first time on a paramedic’s gurney. There they asked me a few questions to gauge my alertness. “What year is it?” “Who is the president?” “Do you know where you are?”and asked me to smile. I got all the quiz questions correct, but failed the smile portion.

Sometime between being put on the stretcher and starting out the door for the ambulance, some arrangements were made, because Mike, my office neighbor and good friend told me very soberly and authoritatively said, “Matt, they’re taking you to the hospital, and Courtney is going with you.” That second part stuck with me. Courtney was one of my best work friends and knowing she was going with me gave me some sort of comfort that things were going to be okay, at least the trip to the hospital in the back of an ambulance with a siren blaring and quickly navigating our way through West Campus and onto an arterial street to the hospital. The only thing I really remember about that ride was trying to figure out the codes and words the EMT was relaying to the hospital. I remember the words “likely stroke,” But the only other memory I have of that trip was trying to reach out for Courtney’s ankle to squeeze it and thank her for riding along, but in the process of trying to reach out for her I passed out on the somewhat comfortable gurney, remember I woke up tired and queasy. But what felt like a little faint and nap, I fell hard asleep and only have a series of strange dreams as I floated in and out of consciousness for a month or so. What I’ve come to learn about things that happened when reaching the Emergency Department at University Medical Center Brackenridge Hospital. Knowing what I know now,I would have been rushed to a triage station where nurses determined that in order to save my life, I needed a Neurosurgeon .. A brain surgeon, like the adage about brain surgery.. Pretty elite medical.. I would have been transferred from the gurney I arrived on to a sterile surgical table and prepped for surgery including shaving my head. Now, I’m no neurosurgeon (Surprise!), in fact I have never taken a health science course in all my higher ed schooling, so my description of the surgery is rudimental at best. The goal of this first surgery was to remove part of my skull (a Craniotomy)

)to allow any brain swelling without damaging the brain by smushing against the inside of the skull. I’m told the inside of our skulls are spiky. I’ll take their word for it found and removed the clot and restored blood flow to my brain. At some point, the designated people at work had to call my emergency contacts on file at work. Which in my case were my parents 3,000 miles away in Oregon, and my sister, also on the other side of the country in WashingtonAlso in here they would have stopped the bleed from continuing to bleed. While I would love to get a detailed play-by-play of all of the treatments I underwent, and the timing of them. What I do know is that some point soon after arriving at the Emergency Department ( that’s what they call them now, it would put a whole new angle on the 90s NBC Hospital TV Drama.), I was intubated and given a tracheotomy. me to be alive to type all of this out. That and how my pulmonologist reinforced that I shouldn’t get caught up with things outside of my control. While I would love to have more of an idea of what went on throughout the process of getting me stable with manageable vitals. At some point , I was stable enough to be transferred to an Acute Care Neuro Rehab hospital in South Austin after spending a few weeks in (Unconsciously)0. :\I was stable enough to be transferred to an acute neuro rehab hospital where I eventually woke up to discover what happened surrounded by family and some very special friends. That was nearly four years ago and I’m still fighting every day to gain mobility and rejoin life. Other than the hemiparesis, I’m healthy; I take medication for my high blood pressure and have regular check-ups with my doctor including blood labs and other vitals.

So, r00000

]]>https://mkinmotion.com/2018/11/21/catching-up-through-faqs/feed/1MKinMotionhttps://mkinmotion.com/2018/11/21/catching-up-through-faqs/My 6 Cross Country Discshttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MKinMotion/~3/zMpiQUviocQ/
https://mkinmotion.com/2018/05/08/my-6-cross-country-discs/#respondWed, 09 May 2018 01:34:31 +0000http://mkinmotion.com/?p=1619It started easy enough with a Tweet, but like everything about music and I, it ended up more complicated than 280 characters into a full-blown Blog article: If you had a 6-disc CD changer in your car and had to drive coast-to-coast What discs would you load?

Disclaimer this entire post was typed,proofread, and formatted with my iPhone (6sPlus,nerdsWhen I woke up after spending a few weeksadrift in coma dreams after my Massive Stroke in 2015, I began to play with a few words that were on my mind Think *”Cillian Murphy waking up at some point in Inception epilogue “like and became a Mantra to me over the last 18 months It’s a Long road to travel to Get Better so why not spend some time Being better?! I did survive, afterall !!! against 9 to 1 odds!i made it i was so sold on this concept that i started trying to convince people to do the same. At one point tearfully looking up at a good friend and saying “we need to be better kinder mor mindful moreinclusive slower to angermindful

One of my Psych Therapists thought it was such a good idea, she had me put together a liBe better List of ideas that would be goals for myself after graduating from the Rehab Program I spent so much time participating in Recovery﻿ and adjusting and coping with new deficits. Some of you must have seen this song coming The album still holds up trust me.

Maybe she’s out there listenin﻿g and can send me the BeBetter Listdoc we put together (matt)(at) (MkinMotio)dotcom

I graduated from rehab as 2016 became 2017 and now as March 2017 quickly approaches (composed on Feb28thI)welcome another chapter, this time in my homeland of Oregon as a refresher, I was born in NW Portland and grew up in the western suburb of Aloha,Oregon from 1977 to 1995 when my parents moved to Renton, Washington and I began a sort of musical chairs of Washington County towns including Tigard, Beaverton, Hillsboro, then Alohaand then Metzger Days of2001again More MetzgerDays again in2002 in .. too much detail Matt .. no reason to type an autobiography, don’t make a joke about there being a quiz later. there being a quiz later. All this to say yes I’m returning to Oregon to live under the care of the best two people in the Galaxyl My parents.and i know this sounds like the outlinefor a movie pitchthose of you who’ve had the pleasure know what I’m talking about and know I’m not exxagerating

So, if you followed my list of Oregon Towns you might recognize that the best people i mentioned are in Salem and that was never a home of mine But over the last several years I’ve become quite smitten with the capital city of my home State. I’m proud of my origin story and look forward to re-discovering some very special places and people historic splaces and veryspecialfplaces of personal history and to add some new ones tooIn addition to this favorite photo of me me plus losing count of how many years i was a cowboy for halloween, it’s no wonder in the grand character arc of my life that i would at some point live in Texas for a while //embedr.flickr.com/assets/client-code.js
Back to the PNW, So what are my plans?!

Remember what “Teddy the Greek” said about nostalgia..it Literally means a pain from an old wound

Put together (write) an album of songs about/for Oregon in the vein of a country version of ?Sufjan Stevens’ Michigan and Illinoise albums .. why country? Well I heard Sturgill Simpson cover “The Promise & it did something. Not the Nirvana cover..

*I think here is as appropriate a place as any to review one of the ground rules of MkinMotion. I often make random references that fly over a lot of people’s heads. I kinda know when i, or more accurately the MkinMotion persona, throws a wildpitch over your head,and I try to craft my words to make the random reference easy googlible

Common question from friends and family: Now that you’re going to be so close, can I visit?

Salem is just an hour south of PDX the airport and the city

Yes, please! I‘ll welcome any visitors I just ask for a head’s up, espefcially anyone from out- of- stateTheres literally handfuls of ways people have used to keep in touch with me espefcially anyone from out- of- state and for you to be ready to be involved in my recovery which is as simple as listen to me make short stories long or talk through things on my be better list ;or lose to me at Trivial Pursuit: TheOriginal 1983 Genus Edition (What can I say? I rule!) , Not only did i learn a lot by playing with grown-ups as a precocious kid,ospent lots of time of my reading maps and remember a high percentage of things i learned in public school lpromise the internet is over flowing with them youtube is rich with short videos articulating complex concept(iehttps://youtu.be/G3wLQz-LgrM). ;You might also be asked to sit for a portrait session or whatever style/skill of photography I’m honingstudying at the time in my CustomizedFormalPhotographyindependent study

st::One of ythe themes of The B e Better List some items are creative and might need collaboration to get the juices flowing or to keeep the creativity going or by literaly going on a short road trip and literally go and maybe help with any video or photography gear involved in the specific project Many of the creative projects are somewhat bucket-listish So you could be asked to participate in that Imagine That!

Myy folks are retired and moved to Salem in 2009. My dad grew up there and between the two of them they have a ton of frriends lots of who are good friends of mine, so after a 15 year hiatus from Oregon inAlaska and Texas.continue my long recovery road in Salem

I left Oregon in 2002 with dreams of of adventure, big fish and a job economy in the Last frontier of Alaska that even “W couldn’t wreck from DC In my experience with the economy of Portland there were MBAs Pouring beer and waiting tables and the Hipster movement was just starting to go wild in Portland I didn’t have today’s beard or the resune yet. For Reference the Portland Pearl District That i #SoooPortland didn’t exist except in the beautiful dreams and beautiful Mind of the beautiful Laurie Ames my all-time High School crushes #friendzone . Don’t google her name just google “Real Estate Mogul of Portland and follow the beauty hint : she no longer lives in the US or Portlanunlike The *Sausage king of Chicago who i think still lives in Chicago and is still thee best name to use for a reservation at a snooty restaurant which neither Portland or Salem have.It’s been 24 that public

So it appears I havent written a formal Blog article/post since the end of 2013. Without pressin the obvious MKinMotion2006 would have a hard time recognizing MKinMotion2017 Life has changed; the world has change;d and that’s really what has me coming back and sniffing around the ol’ long form
A couple of themes i’ll talk to will be literally straight out of my Twitter drafts which seem to point to two two topics near and dear to me these days: 1.

1.politics, but before you groan, hear me out democracy AND politicsi n2017..I was born and raised in the Portland Oregon area and have never lost at an opportunity to defend my homeland and have never been defeated at sticking up for the Oregon state of mind that favors moderate views limitless discovery; the new West; kindness and politeness above most things. where political arguments are settled with the offer of another beer or shot of espresso(seldom expresso, or a tip on picking a good wine to take to a hip genuine adult dinner party

2. My continued one-man Corps of Discovery of #LifeAfter (yep hashtagged a blog post my 2015 Massive stroke (Often in the guise of Stroke Awareness that largely robbed me of so much I loved and the life in Austin,TexAS I’d built from scratch

Since 2007, MKinmotion.com has largely shrank to become a somewhatsimilar opinionatedpersona on Twitter and I fell deep for Microblogging and it wasn’t til sometime in 2009 when an Alaskan Twitter friend pointed out, over saltysnacks at Darwin’s theory; a tired,Somewhat famous dive bar in downtown Anchorage in Downtown Anchorage in which i could almost never be found rarely m

politics, 2.#MyLifeA8fterbut really what hasnt in the lasttwo about those two subjects have been all but lost due to that pesky character limit

]]>https://mkinmotion.com/2017/02/07/emptyingtwitter-drafts/feed/1MKinMotionhttps://mkinmotion.com/2017/02/07/emptyingtwitter-drafts/2013 In Review Through Songshttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MKinMotion/~3/xCeizxmEj_4/
https://mkinmotion.com/2013/12/28/2013-in-review/#respondSun, 29 Dec 2013 05:11:19 +0000http://mkinmotion.com/?p=1365I feel like I’m getting a little predictable. If you’d have told me at the beginning of 2013 that Josh Ritter, Arcade Fire, The National and The Head and the Heart would be releasing new albums in 2013, I’d have said, “Okay, well they’ll be the top 4 albums of the year for me.” As you can see, they make the list, but there were also some good surprises to mix in too. And for those keeping score at home, I’d have expected to put Pearl Jam,

Rather than hash through the albums in their entirety, I figured I’d keep it simple and focus on 10 songs from 10 albums in 2013 that I think stand out. If you really want to know, yes, Trouble Will Find Me was my favorite and most listened to album of 2013.

Here’s an 8Tracks mix of all the songs below, in case you want to give it all a listen.

]]>https://mkinmotion.com/2013/12/28/2013-in-review/feed/0MKinMotionhttps://mkinmotion.com/2013/12/28/2013-in-review/ACL 2012http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MKinMotion/~3/536_aEG4viA/
https://mkinmotion.com/2012/10/15/acl-2012/#respondMon, 15 Oct 2012 23:37:20 +0000http://mkinmotion.com/?p=1341My first year of having the Austin City Limits festival happen since moving to Austin last Fall. I liked that I was able to walk to the festival each day and walk home each night; it takes a lot of pressure off of getting in and out.

Friday
While waiting for The Afghan Whigs, I was treated to most of Ben Howard’s set at the neighboring stage. I’d heard of Ben Howard but couldn’t tell you anything about him. He dazzled the crowd at two stages with a very solid set. The Afghan Whigs were phenomenal; in ways it seems like they stepped right out of 1993, but added a maturity to their arrangements. Alabama Shakes overran one of the smaller stages, so I ended up camping out behind the stage and the sound was pretty good, from some of the reviews I read the sound in the audience wasn’t great, so maybe I lucked out. Sat through most of Weezer’s set, they are so great live! Went to go catch the tail end of Florence and the Machine’s set at the other end of the park and was impressed with the presence and variety of music coming from the stage. M83 drew a big crowd that wanted to hear “Midnight City”. There were sound issues during their set, which tarnished it, but altogether a pretty nice set. The Black Keys did a great job closing out the night as headliners. A few years ago when they played earlier in the day they showed they could draw the crowd and keep them engaged…done and done.

Who I Saw
Afghan Whigs (Ben Howard at next stage)

Alabama Shakes

Weezer
Florence + The Machine

M83

Black Keys

Saturday
Great day. Can’t narrow highlight down to one. Andrew Bird was perfect! The Shins played a really great set…James Mercer even cracked a smile once or twice. Torrential downpours. Heard the first two Jack White tracks: loud and good. Watched Neil Young play for hours in the off and on again rain. Lots of grungy crunch from Neil and Crazy Horse.

Who I Saw
Andrew Bird

The Shins

Jack White

Neil Young

Sunday
The Civil Wars delighted the crowd. Pretty amazing performance considering they’re playing to a huge crowd with just one guitar and two voices. The Lumineers’ popularity has grown exponentially from when they booked for ACL and scheduled for one of the small side stages; needless to say the number of people stacking up to see them at a small stage made it an absolute disaster of people and they were too close to the hip hop band that was drowning out their sound. Iggy played a pretty great set, no complaints about a lack of sound. The Chili Peppers reminded me why they are so great. Given, I think they peaked years ago, but their live performance of new and old material showed the enthusiasm and funk that made them one of my favorite bands in the 90s.

Who I Saw
The Civil Wars

The Lumineers

Iggy and the Stooges

Red Hot Chili Peppers

Overall a pretty great weekend, though I’m thinking that next year I might just be one of those people in the back with a lawn chair looking comfortable to just sit in one place all day. Enjoy this little playlist from some of the songs that stood out at ACL 2012.

]]>https://mkinmotion.com/2012/10/15/acl-2012/feed/0MKinMotionhttps://mkinmotion.com/2012/10/15/acl-2012/Another Chapterhttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MKinMotion/~3/SvitQF5snbE/
https://mkinmotion.com/2012/01/16/another-chapter/#respondTue, 17 Jan 2012 00:09:25 +0000http://mkinmotion.com/?p=1326January is a time to look back at the previous year and also to look ahead to the new year. I’m determined to put some effort into MKinMotion.com in 2012 and get back to my blogging roots a little.

Since my last post here, I’ve moved from Anchorage to Austin, Texas. Quite a transition, indeed! While I’m considering the climate a definite improvement, I can’t say that the transition has been smooth or enjoyable. I’d come to the realization that I was comfortable, but wasn’t happy with most everything to do with my life in Anchorage. Luckily, my move to Austin came with a promising job and a healthy relocation package, but that doesn’t necessarily make it easy. There was plenty of stress surrounding closing out my time at my job in Alaska, packing, and leaving. I’m getting closer and closer to feeling like I’ve settled in, but there’s still plenty of transition to be done.

That being said, I’m excited and hopeful about where I am now. I see a lot of promise in my new job, the company, and I enjoy the people I work with. I’m living just across Lady Bird Lake from Downtown Austin. Being the “Live Music Capital of the World”, I will have plenty of opportunities to get back to one of the key features of the old MKinMotion blog; telling you about great music. Austin is a new chapter in my life and I look forward to sharing some of it with you.

These aren’t New Years resolutions, but they’re goals I’ve made for myself to focus on in 2012. Maybe you can help me with them.

Blog Long Form
Back before Twitter and the short bursts, I took the time to write out entire sentences and paragraphs about things. I’d like to get to back to that. This should go hand in hand with a few of my other 2012 goals. Long form blogging may have gone out of style, but I still think there’s value in putting some time into it.

Be More Social
With all the tools available to keep up with friends and family, I do a terrible job of actually keeping up with friends and family. 2012 will be a year of Skyping, returning emails, phone calls, and generally connecting more with people.

Take More Photos
If I tell my Apple TV to stream the last 500 photos I’ve uploaded to Flickr, photos from 2009 show up in the slide show. While I’m not going to put a number on it, I want to take more photos in 2012.

Explore
This is the furthest East and furthest South I’ve ever lived. There’s a whole new territory of the US to be explored down here. Daytrips, long weekends, road trips, etc. Airfare is so much cheaper than Anchorage, that I’m putting more short trips on my calendar for 2012 to see new and old places. With the photo goal and the long form blogging goal, this should make for a great subject.

Be More Active
With very mild Winter temperatures in Austin, I’ve noticed that I do a lot more walking. I’m not committing to running a 5K or anything, but I am committing myself to do a lot more walking, biking, and paddling (heck, I live on the banks of a lake…) and raise my activity level.